Airmiles Armchair Chatter

[dancin Disney style]

I found that as well. I thought maybe I was just not looking properly. They certainly are a lot more expensive from what I see. We booked one of the dreams resort in the Dominican Republic for the end of February. Did that directly through air transit.

I've been playing around with the site and can't see anything that I could do differently. Makes no sense. I've booked an AI package before and used some miles to reduce my OOP cost. It was really nice to add in all the upgrades and use miles to cover the added cost. With the package prices being so much higher this winter I'm not inclined to shell out an extra $1500+ for the upgrades.

Dreams in the DR are nice. Which one are you going to ? I was looking at the new Secrets Tides but the price is double what I want to spend. We want to do 9-10 days so those extra days are often stupid expensive. I was even considering downgrading to a newly refurbed 4* but with all the upgrades. My biggest issue right now is all the flight times for the DR and MX are terrible. Going south either midday or evening (so waste of a day) and coming back north they arrive home midnight or later. The only place with good flight times is Varadero but the good resorts there cost the same as MX... I'm not paying that much for Cuba.

 

[juniorbugman]

I know one car will need gas then as my nephew is back to work again and has to fill up every other day.

 

[ilovetotravel1977]

I've been playing around with the site and can't see anything that I could do differently. Makes no sense. I've booked an AI package before and used some miles to reduce my OOP cost. It was really nice to add in all the upgrades and use miles to cover the added cost. With the package prices being so much higher this winter I'm not inclined to shell out an extra $1500+ for the upgrades.

Dreams in the DR are nice. Which one are you going to ? I was looking at the new Secrets Tides but the price is double what I want to spend. We want to do 9-10 days so those extra days are often stupid expensive. I was even considering downgrading to a newly refurbed 4* but with all the upgrades. My biggest issue right now is all the flight times for the DR and MX are terrible. Going south either midday or evening (so waste of a day) and coming back north they arrive home midnight or later. The only place with good flight times is Varadero but the good resorts there cost the same as MX... I'm not paying that much for Cuba.

Not using Air Miles, but we are going to Dreams Onyx in Punta Cana end of April, but we booked in June, I think. Paid $2200/pp (7 nights) out of Halifax. Adults 18+ get full access to Breathless Punta Cana next door (and they can access Onyx).

 

[dancin Disney style]

Not using Air Miles, but we are going to Dreams Onyx in Punta Cana end of April, but we booked in June, I think. Paid $2200/pp (7 nights) out of Halifax. Adults 18+ get full access to Breathless Punta Cana next door (and they can access Onyx).

You should check into that…to my knowledge Breathless can go to Dreams but not the other way around. They have made some changes on the last year. A lot of resorts have completely stopped allowing cross over between their adult and family sides.
Onyx is a nice resort. $2200 is a good price for that resort.

 

[ilovetotravel1977]

You should check into that…to my knowledge Breathless can go to Dreams but not the other way around. They have made some changes on the last year. A lot of resorts have completely stopped allowing cross over between their adult and family sides.
Onyx is a nice resort. $2200 is a good price for that resort.

Nope it's true. My SIL is a travel agent who booked it all.

 

[tinkerone]

I've been playing around with the site and can't see anything that I could do differently. Makes no sense. I've booked an AI package before and used some miles to reduce my OOP cost. It was really nice to add in all the upgrades and use miles to cover the added cost. With the package prices being so much higher this winter I'm not inclined to shell out an extra $1500+ for the upgrades.

Dreams in the DR are nice. Which one are you going to ? I was looking at the new Secrets Tides but the price is double what I want to spend. We want to do 9-10 days so those extra days are often stupid expensive. I was even considering downgrading to a newly refurbed 4* but with all the upgrades. My biggest issue right now is all the flight times for the DR and MX are terrible. Going south either midday or evening (so waste of a day) and coming back north they arrive home midnight or later. The only place with good flight times is Varadero but the good resorts there cost the same as MX... I'm not paying that much for Cuba.

Dreams Flora. We are going with our son, daughter-in-law and 7 year old grandson. D-I-L picked out the resort and it is crazy expensive. I let her make all the decisions and then just paid our part. 9 days in a swim up room. Our flight times are actually very good. Leaving 9 AM on the way down from YYZ. 3:40 PM flight on the way home, arriving in YYZ at 7:15.
We did Dreams Riviera in Mexico the month before covid shut the world down and I did not enjoy it so I'm interested to see how this one goes. It wasn't a large resort and they had weddings most every day. The weddings would shut down different restaurants, hot tubs for the wedding guests, even used the stairs to the main building for wedding photos which meant you couldn't get in for hours at a time. We booked an ocean view room and what we got was a view of the delivery parking lot but if you squinted just right, you could see a very wee patch of blue between the vans and the palm trees, lol. But it was warm which is what I am looking for this time. Hope it's better.
I want to try a Secrets, that is on my to do list.

 

[ilovetotravel1977]

@tinkerone join the Dreams Flora facebook group. I join all of those groups just so I can do research for future resorts to stay at. Having a swim up, plus 9 days will definitely up the price! When do you go?

 

[tinkerone]

@tinkerone join the Dreams Flora facebook group. I join all of those groups just so I can do research for future resorts to stay at. Having a swim up, plus 9 days will definitely up the price! When do you go?

I did actually join a Dreams Flora FB group but there is not much activity. I've also been watching a lot of YouTube on that resort. Looks good so I'm excited. We fly out Feb 19 and it can't come soon enough. This snow is starting to wear me down. I do like your idea of joining more groups to do research for future resort stays, I had never thought to do that and get ahead of it. Thanks for the suggestion.
And yeah, the price was definitely more than I have ever paid for that time period. I just closed my eyes and passed over the credit card, lol.

 

[ElCray]

I found that as well. I thought maybe I was just not looking properly. They certainly are a lot more expensive from what I see. We booked one of the dreams resort in the Dominican Republic for the end of February. Did that directly through air transit.

I found that with regular hotel pricing too, where I could get CAA or Mousesavers deals. It was so much cheaper to book direct using a code, and it felt like the Air Miles hotel price was inflated.

 

[tinkerone]

Not sure if anyone is buying the Disney Gift cards through Costco. com but I was able to purchase more today. Even though it says you can only purchase 2, it must reset at some point because this makes 10 I have bought.
It's a great deal. $250 US for $225 US so a 10% return. Got to pay that DCL cruise off some how.

 

[dancin Disney style]

Dreams Flora. We are going with our son, daughter-in-law and 7 year old grandson. D-I-L picked out the resort and it is crazy expensive. I let her make all the decisions and then just paid our part. 9 days in a swim up room. Our flight times are actually very good. Leaving 9 AM on the way down from YYZ. 3:40 PM flight on the way home, arriving in YYZ at 7:15.
We did Dreams Riviera in Mexico the month before covid shut the world down and I did not enjoy it so I'm interested to see how this one goes. It wasn't a large resort and they had weddings most every day. The weddings would shut down different restaurants, hot tubs for the wedding guests, even used the stairs to the main building for wedding photos which meant you couldn't get in for hours at a time. We booked an ocean view room and what we got was a view of the delivery parking lot but if you squinted just right, you could see a very wee patch of blue between the vans and the palm trees, lol. But it was warm which is what I am looking for this time. Hope it's better.
I want to try a Secrets, that is on my to do list.

For the most part Flora is a good resort. It very quickly became over priced...not sure why.

 

[ilovetotravel1977]

For the most part Flora is a good resort. It very quickly became over priced...not sure why.

Once Dreams took it over, that's when lol It was just a renovated older property.

 

[bababear_50]

Well no gas needed here and no online spend ,,,hopefully another offer comes by.
Happy Tuesday!

Hugs Mel

PS
Anyone have CAA for their home and car Insurance.
Thinking of changing.... maybe.
Hugs Mel

 

[hdrolfe]

Super fun couple of weeks, first semester is wrapping up and my child has missed so much school he's in danger of failing like everything, and wow his math teacher is very rude. This is going to be rough. I don't even know what happens if he fails more than one class, I mean one I can see having to do summer school to make it up but this is more than that. Stressing me out, he's stressed out, he fell asleep when he got home last night so wasn't able to do any of the homework. His math teacher was very condescending when she spoke to me this morning, he's not demonstrating that he knows how to solve for x even though he can say what x is... like what does that mean? he gets the right answer but can't write down all the steps he did to get that? And English isn't much better. It's been a struggle to get him to go at all, now two teachers are telling him he's going to fail so he's at the point where "why bother" so that makes it even more fun! Ugh. I never thought when I became a parent that this would be something I'd have to worry about. Sorry, I know it's off topic but I know there are some teachers, and parents, on here who might have some nice words of wisdom for me so I can stop spiraling into "he's going to fail, he's going to drop out of school, he's going to be homeless or live with me forever". I really hope second semester goes better, he'll have gym everyday which he will like, and the other 3 classes will be "easier" for him to manage, as long as he gets good teachers. And this is all at least partly my fault, I took him out of school for a trip (partly because it was booked when that was supposed to be part of the holidays from what I understood).

Ok. Sorry. Back to AM talk.

 

[tinkerone]

Super fun couple of weeks, first semester is wrapping up and my child has missed so much school he's in danger of failing like everything, and wow his math teacher is very rude. This is going to be rough. I don't even know what happens if he fails more than one class, I mean one I can see having to do summer school to make it up but this is more than that. Stressing me out, he's stressed out, he fell asleep when he got home last night so wasn't able to do any of the homework. His math teacher was very condescending when she spoke to me this morning, he's not demonstrating that he knows how to solve for x even though he can say what x is... like what does that mean? he gets the right answer but can't write down all the steps he did to get that? And English isn't much better. It's been a struggle to get him to go at all, now two teachers are telling him he's going to fail so he's at the point where "why bother" so that makes it even more fun! Ugh. I never thought when I became a parent that this would be something I'd have to worry about. Sorry, I know it's off topic but I know there are some teachers, and parents, on here who might have some nice words of wisdom for me so I can stop spiraling into "he's going to fail, he's going to drop out of school, he's going to be homeless or live with me forever". I really hope second semester goes better, he'll have gym everyday which he will like, and the other 3 classes will be "easier" for him to manage, as long as he gets good teachers. And this is all at least partly my fault, I took him out of school for a trip (partly because it was booked when that was supposed to be part of the holidays from what I understood).

Ok. Sorry. Back to AM talk.

I'm not much help but what I can tell you is I had a lot of issues in school. Many do. Throughout my time in school I passed spelling one time. One time! My report card marks for spelling would normally be between 15 and 20%. The one quarter I passed it was with a 51% so barely passed. I had my own special classes for phonics, I was taken out of regular class to do this each week but it never helped. I read books, anything I could get from the library, and had no issues with reading or understanding what I read, but for some reason I could never spell the words after reading them. I still love to read and pick up anything I can find. Still have issues with spelling.
My math was amazing. Like your child, I could get the answer without having to write it down. It was in my head. Easy Peasy. I paid little attention in class, I found it hard to focus on something so mundane, but I always got in the 90%. I retired from a great job at a bank where I easily climbed the ladder. I had an understanding of numbers and spellcheck.
What I'm trying to say is, don't give up hope. Don't let your child give up hope. Not all teachers are great, not all students are meant to be perfect in all subjects. Your child will get to where he needs to be. Give him a hug and some encouragement and see what happens.
And here is a hug for mama

 

[ElCray]

Super fun couple of weeks, first semester is wrapping up and my child has missed so much school he's in danger of failing like everything, and wow his math teacher is very rude. This is going to be rough. I don't even know what happens if he fails more than one class, I mean one I can see having to do summer school to make it up but this is more than that. Stressing me out, he's stressed out, he fell asleep when he got home last night so wasn't able to do any of the homework. His math teacher was very condescending when she spoke to me this morning, he's not demonstrating that he knows how to solve for x even though he can say what x is... like what does that mean? he gets the right answer but can't write down all the steps he did to get that? And English isn't much better. It's been a struggle to get him to go at all, now two teachers are telling him he's going to fail so he's at the point where "why bother" so that makes it even more fun! Ugh. I never thought when I became a parent that this would be something I'd have to worry about. Sorry, I know it's off topic but I know there are some teachers, and parents, on here who might have some nice words of wisdom for me so I can stop spiraling into "he's going to fail, he's going to drop out of school, he's going to be homeless or live with me forever". I really hope second semester goes better, he'll have gym everyday which he will like, and the other 3 classes will be "easier" for him to manage, as long as he gets good teachers. And this is all at least partly my fault, I took him out of school for a trip (partly because it was booked when that was supposed to be part of the holidays from what I understood).

Ok. Sorry. Back to AM talk.

My thoughts are really with you. I find there aren't a lot of venues to share challenges like you're having. It's hard because we don't get any training for parenting moments like this.

Both of my kids struggle in school too, for different reasons. I find ways to blame myself as well and can go on very creative spirals about the doom impending in the future...

I'm not sure what your financial and insurance resources are, or availability of publicly-funded resources where you are, but seeking the help of professionals could help. This could be like a psychoeducational assessment, tutoring, counselling or psychotherapy, extra help at school, and even for you too as a parent. There may be a root cause to these challenges. Discovering them and getting strategies as a parent (including advocacy for your son), and helping your son develop them too, is kind of the best you can do.

Not that it's easy. It's exhausting and emotional work and takes a lot of time and money, or a lot of administrative steps to get added to public services. Maybe trying to redirect your energy into getting to the source and building out a support network - it's really not easy to do that though!!

In fact that's how I found this community. I learned that my daughter had learning needs where the best choice was private school at $17K per year. In despair at never having another family vacation in order to pay for it, I googled "How to go to Disney for free?" And discovered Air Miles, credit card churning, and this awesome, supportive space. Thanks to you all for being out there.

Hope this is helpful in some way.

 

[hdrolfe]

My thoughts are really with you. I find there aren't a lot of venues to share challenges like you're having. It's hard because we don't get any training for parenting moments like this.

Both of my kids struggle in school too, for different reasons. I find ways to blame myself as well and can go on very creative spirals about the doom impending in the future...

I'm not sure what your financial and insurance resources are, or availability of publicly-funded resources where you are, but seeking the help of professionals could help. This could be like a psychoeducational assessment, tutoring, counselling or psychotherapy, extra help at school, and even for you too as a parent. There may be a root cause to these challenges. Discovering them and getting strategies as a parent (including advocacy for your son), and helping your son develop them too, is kind of the best you can do.

Not that it's easy. It's exhausting and emotional work and takes a lot of time and money, or a lot of administrative steps to get added to public services. Maybe trying to redirect your energy into getting to the source and building out a support network - it's really not easy to do that though!!

In fact that's how I found this community. I learned that my daughter had learning needs where the best choice was private school at $17K per year. In despair at never having another family vacation in order to pay for it, I googled "How to go to Disney for free?" And discovered Air Miles, credit card churning, and this awesome, supportive space. Thanks to you all for being out there.

Hope this is helpful in some way.

He has a psyched evaluation, ADHD and anxiety with ODD, it was done through the school when he was in grade 4, also showed he is very intelligent but not quite "gifted". He doesn't believe he has any of it, which I laugh about (not in front of him of course), and won't talk to any one for any help. He doesn't believe anyone can help or provide any insight. I have in the past talked to psychotherapy for help, but it's been so busy I stopped and haven't started again. The school seems to forget this every year and we go through discussions about ways to help him, I have to remind all of this teachers about the ADHD and that he needs things broken down into smaller steps, they either forget or don't really care. He will start the year excited, but then a teacher will "yell" at him about something and it goes downhill. He refuses to go to school. Ultimately that's the big one and it isn't like I can physically drag him there. It's a cycle, he misses something, falls behind, and that makes it even harder to get him there. He is facing the consequences this year as they won't just let him pass as they have up to now. We have talked about other school options, but he won't leave his friends. Now we are facing him failing two important classes, possibly 3, and I don't even know how that can get made up in time for him to graduate. Or go on to grade 10 with his friends, and that will make it even harder to get him to go next year. In any case. This does help, I know I am not alone in this, but it sure feels like it sometimes. I can't have the only kid having this trouble.

 

[ElCray]

He has a psyched evaluation, ADHD and anxiety with ODD, it was done through the school when he was in grade 4, also showed he is very intelligent but not quite "gifted". He doesn't believe he has any of it, which I laugh about (not in front of him of course), and won't talk to any one for any help. He doesn't believe anyone can help or provide any insight. I have in the past talked to psychotherapy for help, but it's been so busy I stopped and haven't started again. The school seems to forget this every year and we go through discussions about ways to help him, I have to remind all of this teachers about the ADHD and that he needs things broken down into smaller steps, they either forget or don't really care. He will start the year excited, but then a teacher will "yell" at him about something and it goes downhill. He refuses to go to school. Ultimately that's the big one and it isn't like I can physically drag him there. It's a cycle, he misses something, falls behind, and that makes it even harder to get him there. He is facing the consequences this year as they won't just let him pass as they have up to now. We have talked about other school options, but he won't leave his friends. Now we are facing him failing two important classes, possibly 3, and I don't even know how that can get made up in time for him to graduate. Or go on to grade 10 with his friends, and that will make it even harder to get him to go next year. In any case. This does help, I know I am not alone in this, but it sure feels like it sometimes. I can't have the only kid having this trouble.

You are 100% right, you are absolutely not alone!! And it's really hard to find the path through. I was about to write about the challenges with the school system and finding people with the skills who understand, but... that would be an enormous entry. Sending you supportive parent vibes. You are not alone.

 

[Silvermist999]

He has a psyched evaluation, ADHD and anxiety with ODD, it was done through the school when he was in grade 4, also showed he is very intelligent but not quite "gifted". He doesn't believe he has any of it, which I laugh about (not in front of him of course), and won't talk to any one for any help. He doesn't believe anyone can help or provide any insight. I have in the past talked to psychotherapy for help, but it's been so busy I stopped and haven't started again. The school seems to forget this every year and we go through discussions about ways to help him, I have to remind all of this teachers about the ADHD and that he needs things broken down into smaller steps, they either forget or don't really care. He will start the year excited, but then a teacher will "yell" at him about something and it goes downhill. He refuses to go to school. Ultimately that's the big one and it isn't like I can physically drag him there. It's a cycle, he misses something, falls behind, and that makes it even harder to get him there. He is facing the consequences this year as they won't just let him pass as they have up to now. We have talked about other school options, but he won't leave his friends. Now we are facing him failing two important classes, possibly 3, and I don't even know how that can get made up in time for him to graduate. Or go on to grade 10 with his friends, and that will make it even harder to get him to go next year. In any case. This does help, I know I am not alone in this, but it sure feels like it sometimes. I can't have the only kid having this trouble.

Does your school offer an IEP (individual education plan)? I know at our high school, my kids have had classmates that have IEPs and they receive the additional support with various classes and even evaluations. Has this been discussed before after your son’s diagnosis? Here is some info on this program. https://www.ontario.ca/page/individual-education-plans#:~:text=An individual education plan (%20IEP,to%20learn%20and%20demonstrate%20learning.

In terms of additional help with coursework, are there tutoring clubs at your school or neighbourhood where carefully selected upper year students tutor younger students for volunteer hours? We actually have this at our high school (my son leads this club) and it is quite successful, most of the students are grade 8s from feeder schools or grade 9 students. The tutoring is done during lunch hours at the school library for the grade 9s so it is supervised by a teacher. This might be an option if hiring a tutor or enrolling in programs like Kumon are not feasible.

 

[Debbie]

Does your school offer an IEP (individual education plan)? I know at our high school, my kids have had classmates that have IEPs and they receive the additional support with various classes and even evaluations. Has this been discussed before after your son’s diagnosis? Here is some info on this program. https://www.ontario.ca/page/individual-education-plans#:~:text=An individual education plan (%20IEP,to%20learn%20and%20demonstrate%20learning.

In terms of additional help with coursework, are there tutoring clubs at your school or neighbourhood where carefully selected upper year students tutor younger students for volunteer hours? We actually have this at our high school (my son leads this club) and it is quite successful, most of the students are grade 8s from feeder schools or grade 9 students. The tutoring is done during lunch hours at the school library for the grade 9s so it is supervised by a teacher. This might be an option if hiring a tutor or enrolling in programs like Kumon are not feasible.

This is what I came to say. Was he given an IEP when he was diagnosed? If not, I would contact the guidance department and see if it is possible to have a meeting and get his needs in writing. At that point, teachers are expected to follow the IEP, which is in place to ensure children are successful.